Advantages

Disadvantages

See Review

We had always wanted a nice posh cutlery set that we could bring out for special occasions. My Mum was bought a set years ago and when she died the set went to my sister. She had never used it so when she found out we wanted a set she passed it on to us. The set is made by Sheffield Cutlery and it is absolutely beautiful.

The set comes in a canteen which is black leather looking with velvet inside. There are spaces where the cutlery sits so you can put it all away and keep it nice. The set is made silver plated with the knife blades made from stainless steel. There are 6 each of two sizes of knife, fork and spoon plus two larger spoons that can be used for serving.

The pattern on the handles is very pretty and I think it is called King. The handles are quite bulky with the pattern raised on them. The large size knife and fork are really big which is why my sister never wanted to use them but we think they are fine and we use them for the adults of the family at Xmas and other times, and use the smaller ones for the kids. We do not have lots of different courses so it works out fine.

When we have finished using the cutlery we wash it up as normal in the sink with washing up liquid, make sure they are properly dry and then store them away back in the box. We find that this way they are still fine to use the next time they come out. If now and then we leave one out by mistake you notice that the colour had gone a bit brown so to clean this to a nice shiny sliver colour again I found a cheap way of doing it. I get a plastic box like a food storage box that the piece or pieces of cutlery will fit in and lay a piece of tin foil in the bottom. Then fill up the box with boiling water and add some vinegar then drop the dirty looking cutlery into the water and leave it to soak for about ten minutes. Then I take the cutlery out and give it a good polish with a dry tea towel and hey presto, the shine has come back again. I am not sure how this works, it must be something to do with a chemical reaction with the vinegar and the tin foil but it is cheap and easy and works every time.

We have been using our set of cutlery now for about 10 years and use it about 20 times in a year and it all looks just as nice as when it was first bought back in the 80s. You can still buy from Sheffield Cutlery, it is very expensive, a set the size that we have would now be about £700 to buy but they are a good thing if you can afford them or want to buy something special for a present for someone. You can buy a set of just one of each item if you wanted to and then build up your collection but that way you wouldn't get the canteen to keep them in so you would have to make sure you have somewhere dry and dark where the air can't get to them to tarnish them.